By the time a new mayor and City Council candidates take
office in December, the city will have laid out roughly half a mile of
track and spent or contractually obligated at least $117 million
for the streetcar project. The contractual obligations mean it could
cost more to cancel the project than to finish it, which will cost the
city an estimated total of $88 million after deducting $45 million in
federal grants. Still, mayoral candidate John Cranley and several
council candidates insist they will try to cancel the project upon
taking office. Check out CityBeat’s full in-depth story here.

The parking plan’s upfront payment has been reduced to $85 million,
down from $92 million, and the city, as opposed to the Greater
Cincinnati Port Authority, could be on the hook for $14 million to $15
million to build a garage at Seventh and Sycamore streets, according to
an Oct. 9 memo from City Manager Milton Dohoney. The city manager claims
the lump sum payment dropped as a result of rising interest rates and
the Port Authority’s decision to relax parking meter hours outside
Over-the-Rhine and the Cincinnati Business District. The parking plan
leases Cincinnati’s parking meters, lots and garages to the Port
Authority, which plans to hire private companies to operate the assets. CityBeat covered the plan in greater detail here and the controversy surrounding it here.

Gov. John Kasich is considering using an executive order
to expand the state’s Medicaid program with federal funds. The
executive order would expand eligibility for the government-run health
insurance program so it includes anyone up to 138 percent of the federal
poverty level, or nearly $15,900 in annual income for an individual.
Kasich would then on Oct. 21 ask Ohio’s seven-member
legislative-spending oversight panel to approve federal funds for the
expansion. Kasich, a Republican, has aggressively pursued the Medicaid
expansion, which the federal government promises under Obamacare to
completely fund through 2016 then phase down and indefinitely hold its payments at 90
percent of the expansion’s total costs. But Republican legislators
claim the federal government might not be able sustain the payments,
even though the federal government has met its payments for the much
larger overall Medicaid program since it was created in 1965.

At its final full session before the November election, City Council approved nearly $854,000 in tax credits
for Pure Romance to bring the company to downtown Cincinnati for at
least 20 years. Councilman Charlie Winburn, the lone Republican on
council, was the only one to vote against the tax incentives. The city
administration estimates the deal will lead to at least 126 new
high-paying jobs in downtown Cincinnati over three years and nearly $2.6
million in net tax revenue over two decades. Gov. John Kasich’s
administration was originally supposed to provide some tax incentives to
the company, but it ultimately reneged after supposedly deciding that
the company isn’t part of an industry the state typically supports.
Critics say Kasich’s administration is just too “prudish” to support a
company that includes sex toys in its product lineup.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Ohio yesterday announced it’s suing Ohio
over anti-abortion restrictions passed in the 2014-2015 state budget.
The ACLU claims the restrictions are unrelated to the budget and
therefore violate the Ohio Constitution’s “single subject” rule, which
requires each individual law keep to a single subject to avoid
complexity and hidden language. CityBeat covered the state budget in further detail here.

Hamilton County Administrator Christian Sigman says he’s monitoring the impact of the federal government shutdown
with some concerns. “I’m more concerned if this goes more than four
weeks or so, when we start talking about reimbursement programs for our
larger social programs such as food stamps and cash assistance to the
needy and those types of things. We just don’t have the money to front
that type of thing,” he said. CityBeat covered the shutdown in further detail here.

City Council yesterday passed a resolution condemning
State Sen. Bill Seitz’s attempts to weaken Ohio’s renewable energy and
efficiency mandates. A study from Ohio State University and Ohio
Advanced Energy Economy found Ohioans will spend $3.65 billion more on
their electricity bills over the next 12 years if the mandates are
repealed. CityBeat covered the attempts to repeal the mandates in further detail here and the national conservative groups behind the calls to repeal here.

Project moves forward despite political and financial hurdles

Standing in front of roughly 40 supporters, city leaders gave the order on Tuesday to lay down the first two streetcar tracks.

The milestone has been years in the making for the $133
million streetcar project — ever since City Council approved the streetcar plan in 2008 and the project broke ground in February 2012.

“This is another great day in our great city,” proclaimed Mayor Mark Mallory, a major proponent of the streetcar. “This is the project that will not stop.”

Political and financial hurdles snared the massive project in the past five years, but city officials say the construction phase is so far within budget and on time, putting it on track to open to the public on Sept. 15, 2016.

Until then, City Manager Milton Dohoney
asked for patience as construction progresses.

But not everyone was happy with the milestone. Ex-Councilman John
Cranley, a streetcar opponent who’s running for mayor against streetcar
supporter Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls, criticized the city for not
delaying the project until a new mayor takes office in December.

“The streetcar has been a bad idea and a bad deal for the
people of Cincinnati from the beginning,” Cranley said in a statement.
“To lay track for a project that can’t be completed for three years
right before an election that will serve as a referendum on the project
is a slap in face to the voters.”

Multiple streetcar supporters at the event told CityBeat
that Cranley’s demands are ridiculous. They say that delaying a project
with contractual obligations and deadlines for two months because of a
political campaign would cripple the city’s ability to take on future
projects as weary contractors question the city’s commitments.

Streetcar supporters back the project as both another
option for public transit and an economic development driver. Previous
studies from consulting firm HDR and the University of Cincinnati found
the Over-the-Rhine and downtown loop will produce a three-to-one return on
investment.

Opponents say the project is too costly. They argue the
project forced the city to raise property taxes and forgo other capital
projects, such as the interchange at Interstate 75 and Martin Luther
King Drive.

The project already went through two referendums in 2009 and 2011
in which voters effectively approved the streetcar.

Gov. John Kasich
pulled $52 million in federal funds from the project in 2011 after he won the 2010
gubernatorial election against former Gov. Ted Strickland, whose administration
allocated the money to the streetcar.

Earlier in 2013, City Council closed a $17.4 million
budget gap after construction bids for the project came in higher than
expected.

Despite the hurdles, city leaders remain committed to the project. They estimate the first section of the track —
on Elm Street between 12th and Henry streets — will be finished in
January 2014.

Local business leaders are calling on the city government to change its contracting policies to target minority- and women-owned businesses. Advocates argue the city’s inclusion rates have greatly dropped
since Cincinnati did away with its inclusion program in the 1990s, but
the city administration points out the rates are likely understated
because women- and minority-owned businesses are no longer required to report
themselves as minorities or women. The business leaders say the figures are too low regardless,
which could have big implications since minority-owned businesses are
more likely to hire minorities, who have twice the unemployment rate as
white residents. As a result of court rulings, Cincinnati needs to first
conduct a disparity study before it makes any changes that specifically target minorities or women.

Gabrielle Giffords’s anti-gun violence organization is opening an Ohio chapter
to promote legislation that intends to protect both the public
and the rights of gun owners. Giffords, a former U.S. representative
who survived an assassination attempt, has been touring around the
country — at one point coming to Cincinnati
— to speak out against gun violence. Gun control legislation
failed in the U.S. Senate in April after it fell short of getting 60 votes to overcome
procedural hurdles, even though polling shows a clear majority of
Americans favor such legislation.

Local government funding may be further reduced
as a result of recent tax cuts because the Local Government Fund traditionally gets a percent of state tax revenue. Specifically, critics are concerned
less state tax revenue will slow down “natural growth” in funding to
cities and counties. Last week, an analysis from Policy Matters Ohio
found the recently passed two-year state budget already reduces local government funding, following even steeper reductions in the previous budget. The cuts since Gov. John Kasich took office have cost Cincinnati more than $22 million.

The federal government is committing another $5 million to Cincinnati’s streetcar project,
but the city must first close the budget gap that has recently put the
project in danger. The U.S. Department of Transportation is also asking
the city to restore certain aspects of the project, including a
passenger information system and a screen or wall that would block power
substations from public view. City Council’s Budget and Finance
Committee is expected to vote on the project’s $17.4 million budget gap
today. The latest proposed fixes from the city manager would pull funding from multiple capital projects, including improvements around the Horseshoe Casino, and issue more debt.

Cincinnati and Hamilton County announced a compromise
Friday that will end the county's funding hold on sewer projects. As a
result, the city will be required to rework its “responsible bidder”
ordinance and repeal the “local hire” and “local preference” laws that
incited county commissioners into passing the funding hold in the first
place. The city says its responsible bidder law creates local jobs and
encourages job training, but the county argues that law’s rules favor
unions and push up costs on Metropolitan Sewer District projects. CityBeat covered the city-county conflict in further detail here.

Ohio is No. 3 in the nation for “megadeals”
— massive government subsidies to corporations that are meant to
encourage in-state job creation — but a new report found many of the
deals rarely produce the kind of jobs initially touted by public
officials. For Cincinnati, the risks of megadeals are nothing new: In
2011, the city’s $196.4 million megadeal with Convergys collapsed when the company failed to keep downtown employment at or above
1,450, and the company agreed to pay a $14 million reimbursement to the city.

The prison company that owns and operates a northeastern Ohio prison lost four contracts around the nation in June, according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). In May, CityBeat released an in-depth report
looking at the Corrections Corporation of America’s handling of the
Lake Erie Correctional Institution, finding evidence of rising violence
and unsanitary conditions.

President Barack Obama will make a speech
tomorrow unveiling sweeping plans for climate change. The president is
expected to impose a series of regulations, particularly on power
plants, with executive powers, which means the plans won’t require
congressional action.

Ever since the Cincinnati streetcar has been envisioned,
the mass transit project has been mired in misrepresentations driven
largely by opponents and politicians. CityBeat has a breakdown of the misrepresentations here, showing some of the silliest and biggest falsehoods claimed by opponents and supporters.

Facing city budget cuts, public access media organization Media Bridges is shutting down by the end of the year.
The city picked up Media Bridges’ funding after the organization lost
state funding that had been provided through an agreement with Time
Warner Cable. But city officials claim the local funding was supposed to
act as a one-year reprieve and nothing more — a claim Media Bridges was
apparently never made aware of until it was too late. To justify the
cut, the city cites public
surveys that ranked budget programs in terms of importance, but a look
at the citizen surveys shows the demographics were skewed against
low-income people who make the most use out of programs like Media
Bridges.

If you’re headed to Fountain Square today, expect to see
some images of bloodied fetuses and fetal limbs. An anti-abortion group
is showing a video with the gruesome visuals
as part of a protest against what it sees as “the greatest human rights
injustice of our time.” The group defends its tactics by citing its
First Amendment rights. The U.S. Supreme Court has so far refused to
rule one way or the other on the issue, but, barring some restrictions
for airwave broadcasts, the court typically protects all kinds of
political speech as long as it’s not pornographic.

The Cincinnati Police Department is changing how it responds to calls
to focus on what it sees as the most important issues, such as impacting violent crime,
youth intervention efforts, long-term problem solving projects, traffic
safety and neighborhood quality-of-life issues. The biggest change will come with how the department reacts to minor traffic accidents: It will still
respond, but it may not file a report.

The so-far-unnamed Greater Cincinnati coalition working to reduce the local infant mortality rate set a goal
yesterday: zero. It’s a dramatic vision for a region that, at 13.6, has
an infant mortality rate more than twice the national average of six,
as CityBeat covered here.

Councilman P.G. Sittenfeld announced in a statement
yesterday that he will be gathering local leaders and health officials
to encourage the state to expand Medicaid. The expansion, which CityBeat covered in further detail here,
would save Ohio money and insure half a million Ohioans in the
next decade, according to an analysis by the Health Policy Institute of
Ohio.

Streetcar track arrives, thousands to get new ballots, "right to work" supporters aim for 2014

Early voting for the 2013 City Council and mayoral elections is now underway. Find your voting locationhere. Normal voting hours will be 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., although some days will be extended.

City leaders will host an event today to lay down the
first streetcar track. The event will take place at 11 a.m. near Music
Hall at Elm and 12th streets. The moment has been years in the making
for Cincinnati, which continued pursuing the streetcar project through
two referendums, Gov. John Kasich’s decision to pull $52 million from
the project and a separate $17.4 million budget gap. Meanwhile, ex-Councilman John Cranley, citing costs, says he would cancel the project
if he wins the mayoral election against streetcar supporter Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls on Nov. 5, even though canceling at this point could cost more than completing the project.

More than 3,000 Cincinnatians who already voted early will get new ballots in the mail
after an Ohio Supreme Court decision forced the Hamilton County Board
of Elections to change the ballot language for Issue 4, the tea
party-backed city charter amendment that would semi-privatize
Cincinnati’s pension system. Sally Krisel, deputy director of the
Hamilton County Board of Elections, says the old ballots will at least
count for every candidate and issue except Issue 4, but the 3,000-plus
voters could have to refile their ballots to have their votes counted on
the controversial pension issue. The board will make the final decision
on whether to count the old votes for or against Issue 4 after it hears from state officials and
reviews election law, Krisel says.

Supporters of a type of anti-union law infamously dubbed “right to work” say they’re gathering petitions
to get the issue on the ballot in 2014. The anti-union proposal
wouldn’t ban unions, but it would significantly weaken them by banning
agreements between companies and unions that mandate union membership
for employees and allow unions to collect dues and fees from nonunion
members. The proposal first lost in Ohio in 1958, and it’s been a
“flashpoint” for union politics ever since, according to The Columbus Dispatch.

Cranley says he’d pick a Democrat as his vice mayor
if elected to office. The announcement came on the same day a group of
Democratic ward chairs pressured him to announce he’d pick a Democrat as
his vice mayor. It was previously rumored that Cranley would choose
Independent Councilman Chris Smitherman over any of the Democrats on
City Council. The news is the second time in a week Cranley attempted to
rebuke the idea that he’s the conservative alternative to Qualls. Previously, Cranley told CityBeat
he doesn’t want and would reject an endorsement from the Coalition
Opposed to Additional Spending and Taxes (COAST), a conservative group
with a history of anti-gay causes.

In a 3-1 vote, the Hamilton County Board of Elections decided to keep Randy Simes, the pro-streetcar founder of UrbanCincy.com,
on the local voter rolls. Tea party groups contested Simes’ ability to
vote in Cincinnati because he’s currently on assignment in South Korea
and they believed he lived in Chicago when he voted in the Sept. 10
mayoral primary. But Simes says he intends to return to Cincinnati once
he completes his assignment in South Korea, leading election officials
to conclude that the case is similar to when Procter & Gamble or
General Electric employees work abroad but retain their right to vote in
Cincinnati. Simes’ supporters said the whole case reeked of politics;
the tea party groups behind the charges oppose Qualls for mayor, who
Simes openly supports.

Cincinnati yesterday broke ground
on its new police headquarters in District 3, which
covers East Price Hill, East Westwood, English Woods, Lower Price Hill,
Millvale, North Fairmount, Riverside, Roll Hill, Sayler Park,
Sedamsville, South Cumminsville, South Fairmount, West Price Hill and
Westwood on the West Side.

WCPO will host a mayoral candidate debate between Qualls and Cranley tonight at 7 p.m. Submit questions for the candidates here.

The Cincinnati Enquirer yesterday hosted an online chat with streetcar project executive John Deatrick. Check out the replay here.

With the backing of Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine,
law enforcement around the state have been secretly using facial
recognition software for the past two months that scans driver’s licenses and mug shots to identify crime suspects. In emails and documents obtained by The Cincinnati Enquirer,
DeWine and other state officials apparently couldn’t agree whether the
program is in beta testing or full launch and when they should tell the
public about it. The program went live without the attorney general’s
initial approval and many protocols that protect Ohioans’ security and
privacy, raising concerns about whether law enforcement have been able
to abuse the new tool.

The Greater Cincinnati Port Authority on Friday acknowledged it will ramp up enforcement and tickets
once it takes over Cincinnati’s parking meters, lots and garages, but
it claimed the move is meant to encourage people to pay up, not raise
revenue that will make the parking lease more profitable for the Port or
the private operators it’s hiring. The Port also said it had taken
steps to make the parking lease a better deal for locals, including a
reduction in operation hours in neighborhoods and some downtown areas.
The city is leasing its parking assets to the Port for a one-time
injection of revenue and annual installments that are supposed to go to
development projects that will grow the city’s tax base. But opponents
of the lease say it will take away too much control of the city’s
parking services and hurt businesses and residents by raising parking
rates and hours.

Vacant buildings at the corner of Henry and Race streets
will be demolished today to make room for a maintenance facility for
Cincinnati’s streetcars — just the latest sign the project is moving
forward. Mayor Mark Mallory, Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls and John
Deatrick, streetcar project executive director, will attend the
demolition and a press event preceding it, which will take place at 1
p.m.

A new video from the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments (OKI) shows how bad traffic
will get if the Brent Spence Bridge isn’t replaced. In the video, OKI
claims the current state of the bridge is dangerous and damages the economy. The bridge project is currently estimated at $2.5 billion. At least part of
that sum will be paid with tolling if state officials get their way.

Qualls and Cincinnati Public Schools Superintendent Mary
Ronan will today discuss a district-wide travel plan that intends to
provide safe routes for students walking and biking to school. The plan, which would use Ohio Department of Transportation
funds, makes improvements to crosswalks and pedestrian crossing signals,
among other changes. Qualls’ office says the plan is timely as CPS today
begins its first week back to school.

Cuts in all levels of government, which Republican state officials call “right-sizing,” might be hindering Ohio’s economic recovery.
Only California, New York and Florida have cut more public jobs than
Ohio. At the same time, Ohio’s job growth over the past year has
stagnated at 0.7 percent. The state has cut local government funding by
half since Kasich took office, as CityBeat covered in further detail here.

In a letter to the city solicitor, a conservative organization is threatening more legal action
to stop the city’s plans to lease its parking meters, lots and garages
to the Greater Cincinnati Port Authority. The Coalition Opposed to
Additional Spending and Taxes (COAST) claims the city manager exceeded his authority when he
made two “significant and material” changes to the lease agreement after
City Council approved the deal in March. If the city solicitor doesn’t
take up the legal challenge, COAST could sue the city by itself.
Supporters of the parking lease argue it’s necessary to fund development
projects in the city and modernize the city’s parking services, but
opponents say it gives up too much control over the city’s parking
meters, lots and garages and will hurt businesses downtown.

Mayor Mark Mallory will today join fellow streetcar supporters
at Rhinegeist Brewery to discuss the streetcar project’s latest news
and future. The city on July 15 set an opening date of Sept. 15, 2016
after finalizing a construction contract with Messer Construction, Prus
Construction and Delta Railroad, which was made possible after City Council closed a $17.4 million budget gap in June. CityBeat recently debunked some of the misrepresentations surrounding the streetcar project here.

Public access media organization Media Bridges is shutting down
following city and state funding cuts. The organization’s demise is a
great loss to producers like Rufus Johnson, who used its resources for years. The city picked up Media Bridges’ funding after the
state eliminated a fund that was provided by Time Warner Cable, but even the local funding was fully cut in the budget passed in May. City officials
have justified the cuts by pointing to citizen surveys that ranked Media
Bridges poorly in terms of budgetary importance, but a CityBeat
analysis found the surveys were skewed against the low-income
Cincinnatians that benefit the most from public access programs like
Media Bridges.

State Rep. Peter Beck, a Republican from Mason, is facing multiple felony charges
related to securities fraud. A lawsuit filed in Hamilton County by
investors alleges that money invested at the request of Beck and others
was used for personal gain — specifically, Beck’s campaign — instead of a
business investment as originally intended. Beck has been in power
since 2009, and his current term is set to expire in 2014.

The driver who last August accidentally hit and killed a local cyclist is awaiting his sentence.
Local bike advocacy groups are asking courts to give the maximum
penalty to the driver, who’s facing at most six months in jail and a
$1,000 fine.

The local housing market is rapidly recovering in a
continuing good sign for the economy, with single-family home permits up
48 percent in June compared to the year before, according to the Home
Builders Association of Greater Cincinnati.

Cincinnati Reds games are No. 3 for local TV ratings in all of Major League Baseball, behind only the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals.

If enough private contributors agree to finance the streetcar’s operating costs, they could address a major concern raised by streetcar opponents and provide the clearest path forward for the $132.8 million streetcar project since the new mayor and City Council took office early this month.

The Haile Foundation already contributed $1 million to an
operating reserve fund for the streetcar, but Avner cautions that his
organization’s donation is only the beginning, given all the other
entities interested in moving the streetcar forward.

Avner says 14 other business and philanthropic leaders supported the SORTA concept in person or through writing in time for SORTA’s board of
trustees meeting on Tuesday. Among other community leaders,
Avner cites Otto Budig, Cathy Crain of Cincinnati State, William Portman of the University of Cincinnati, Jeannie
Golliher of the Cincinnati Development Fund, Rick Greiwe of Greiwe
Development and Jack and Peg Wyant of Grandin Properties.

In a letter to SORTA, the Haile Foundation offers to
recruit and financially establish a commission of community leaders that
will work with the agency to create an operating and revenue plan
that will require no funds from the city of Cincinnati. The letter also promises to leverage the initial $1
million investment to secure additional contributors and build a fund
that would pay for a full year of operating costs.

Mayor John Cranley called SORTA’s offer “woefully
insufficient” in a press conference on Tuesday. Cranley said the city will need financial assurances far above the Haile
Foundation’s $1 million to cover $3.4-$4.5 million in annual operating costs for the streetcar over 30 years.

Councilman Kevin Flynn, one of two potential swing votes
on City Council, agreed with Cranley’s assessment, but he said the proposal could become a viable option if the city receives more
assurances from SORTA and private entities that show the groups are serious in their offer.

At this point, private contributors might be necessary to
save the streetcar project. Cranley and Flynn said on Dec. 12 that
operating costs must be written off the city’s budget if the project is
to move forward.

SORTA already agreed to help operate the streetcar if the
project is completed, but its decision to take up the operating costs shows
an additional commitment to the project.

The agency claims bus services will not be impacted by its increased commitment to the streetcar.

City Council expects to vote on Thursday on whether to
restart the streetcar project. Council paused the project on
Dec. 4 while the city audits the project’s completion, cancellation and
operating costs.

Mandel is being taken to court by liberal blog
Plunderbund. The blog claims Mandel has made it extra difficult to get
public records.

Preliminary data for Ohio schools was released yesterday.
Some data is still being held back while an investigation into
fraudulent reporting from some schools is finished, but the data gives some insight into how
schools performed during the 2011-2012 school year. The data can be
found here. From a local angle, the data shows Cincinnati Public
Schools (CPS) did not meet “adequate yearly progress,” a federal standard that
measures progress in student subgroups, such as minority groups; but CPS
did meet standards for “value-added growth,” which measures the
expected progress in state testing for all students between the third
and eighth grades.

City Council approved the $29 million financing plan for
the streetcar yesterday. The plan will use $15 million from the Blue Ash
airport deal to move utility lines and pipes. The city claims the $15
million, which was originally promised to neighborhood projects, will
be reimbursed by Duke Energy once the city settles a conflict with the
energy company. Duke and the city are currently arguing over who has to
pay to move the utility lines and pipes.

An Ohio state representative is asking the federal
government to monitor the election more closely. Rep. Alicia Reece, a
Cincinnati Democrat, is asking U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to send monitors
to the state to ensure no funny business goes on in voting booths on
Nov. 6. The request is partly in response to a recent court ruling
that forces Ohio to count provisional ballots if the ballots were
brought around by poll worker errors.

Ohio’s ability to stop political lies was upheld
yesterday. The Coalition Opposed to Additional Spending and Taxes
(COAST) tried to put an end to the government power, which COAST claimed
was censorship, by taking it to court, but a U.S. judge upheld the
ability. The judge, who is a former chairman of the Hamilton County
Republican Party, said COAST did not properly display that its speech was held
down by the law. Considering some of COAST’s tweets, the judge is
probably right.

Ohio might expand Medicaid, but not to the extent asked
for by Obamacare. That’s what the state’s Medicaid director said
yesterday, anyway. A previous study found Medicaid expansions improved and might
have saved lives in other states, and other studies have found Medicaid
expansions may save the state money by cutting uncompensated costs.

Gov. John Kasich signed a series of bills shoring up
Ohio’s public pension system yesterday. The laws will cut benefits
and raise eligibility requirements, but state officials insist the new
laws will mostly affect future retirees.

NASA wants samples from Mars, and it has a plan. The new plan may require a robot-to-human hand-off in space.